For those of you melee people who seem to be having a hard time with him, I thought I would offer my method of killing him. This is by no means the only way for a pure melee to kill him, just how it worked best for me.

[spoiler=] Obviously you want to take out the archers first on the battlements. Once down on an even playing field with the big guy, stand right in front of him. When he raises his shield to squash you like a bug, hold O and run clockwise around him. (clockwise will be circling to his sword arm) For some reason the shield smash radius is smaller on his sword arm side, combined with his foot being further back, you have less distance to run around him than it you go counterclockwise.

Now that you are behind him, quickly tap the R3 button to auto lock onto his foot, this will spin you around to face him... strike a few times and then UNLOCK your targeting. Unlocking not only allows you to move slightly faster but you will be able to watch what his hands are doing... if he is going to shield smash again just take a few steps back, re-lock on and repeat. If he is going to jump backwards, get the hell out of the way.

Once he falls to the ground lock onto his head (which shouldn't be hard because you are already behind him and he falls backwards) and strike away. I like to put away my shield and R2 strike him. My endurance allowed for 2 hard hits this way for massive damage.[/spoiler]

I hope this helps those in need.

This message was edited by Dameron on Nov 14 2009.

another tip for pure melee if you have any turpintine left after phalanx (sp?) use them on your weapon when he ready to fall for a bigger damage output on his head or try and get the crescent falchion =1 from 4-1 behind the first dual-katana i used that with only 10 magic (only stat that enhances it's dmg) and i took his feet out in 3 1hand r2 strikes each and killed him the first time he dropped with 4 1hand r2 strikes (they somehow do more damage then 2hand r2 strikes with flachions in general )